COME ALONG, WE'RE GOING TO THE TRANS-LUX TO HISS WILLIAM BUCKLEY.
Jay Nordlinger, who practices what at National Review passes for whimsy, tells us (as he has apparently done before) that hissing is for commies:
Speaking of longstanding complaints: I have always objected to hissing. And, all of my life, the Left has hissed. They’ve hissed movies, plays, music, me — anything they don’t like. I’m sure that conservatives have hissed, along the way. Frankly, I have never been present for this.
Liberals also loudly unwrap candy at the opera, I'm told.
Believe it or don't, this is not the craziest thing that went out under Nordlinger's name today. Here's a letter he says he received:
My girlfriend works at a retail clothing store in Chicago. She has recently had some issues with her manager (long stories, details don’t matter).
Today, she was told by the manager, “Because you do such a good job selling, the other employees are intimidated. They are intimidated by your success. We want to move you to a fitting room [outta sight, outta mind], so other employees have a chance on the floor. I just want to have an environment where all people are equal and everybody does the same.”
She has already found another job, and is leaving. By the way, the store called her into a meeting a few months ago and told her, “Employees said that, in the breakroom, you mentioned having a Bush-Cheney shirt. Some of them thought that was offensive, so we would like you not to speak of it at work.”
Astonishingly, Nordlinger seems to buy this ridiculous story of a retail business where the manager doesn't want a super-salesman on the selling floor because liberal fascism: "We can accept this kind of country — just accept defeat, or a kind of dhimmitude," he sighs. "Or we can push back. Push back in myriad ways, at myriad turns." He doesn't name the letter's author; Heywood Jablome, I'm guessing; sounds like his work.
And then someone sends him another Penthouse Letter, which he also buys:
Here’s some pushback for you. Someone on my team once complained to my boss that I had weighty books on my desk, which intimidated her. It made her reluctant to ask me questions. (She was reluctant, all right, but for different reasons.) The boss asked me to keep my books in a drawer, rather than on the desk itself. I adamantly refused, and challenged my boss to fire me for my refusal.
I've half a mind to send him a letter about how my liberal boss was intimidated because I have such a big dick.